八八六 Taiwanese Pop Up

八八六 Taiwanese Pop Up Taiwanese pop-up based in Seattle, WA - 從美國探索台灣菜式
pop-ups and private supper clubs

Many Buddhist analogies liken the course of our lives to bamboo. Perhaps because bamboo is evergreen, available in many ...
17/04/2026

Many Buddhist analogies liken the course of our lives to bamboo. Perhaps because bamboo is evergreen, available in many different times of year and takes on many forms. In Taiwan during the Spring, you'll see three most celebrated kinds of bamboo: Green (綠竹）, Ma, （麻竹）and Makino （桂竹).
Greens are tender and sweet, often eaten raw with a bit of Kewpie mayo. So sweet in fact it's often treated like dessert and topped with sprinkles. Ma is among the most prevalent and versatile, a bit more coarse than the greens and good in soups and stir fries. Its leaves are also used to wrap zhongzi/bazhang. Makino is the toughest, most resilient, and therefore great for braises. It's also prized by indigenous groups and used in crafts, or to make furniture.
Pictured here you'll see examples of all three: tender green bamboo with its translucent ivory flesh served raw, ma bamboo with a straight cone like appearance in a market in Tainan, and narrow, hollow makino which I've confited in beef fat.
Now your turn. What is your favorite bamboo dish or favorite uses of bamboo?

Spring, when it seems all produce is bursting with sweetness, mustard greens remain a bitter outlier. We more often see ...
11/04/2026

Spring, when it seems all produce is bursting with sweetness, mustard greens remain a bitter outlier. We more often see fermented and pickled mustards, preservation methods that mellow out its bitter and evolves it into an savory ferment with an almost smokey profile.
In soup though, no one is apologizing for it's herbaceous bitter, which brings out the sweet minerality in these tiny clams. It reminds me of one of my favorite phrases 甘甜, used to describe something that isn't overtly sweet get carries a faint, sweet aftertaste. This soup with it's 3 to 4 ingredients has a complexity that is almost wine-like.

A little leftover mix mix. Fulfilled a catering request did the UW Center for Taiwan Studies. Can you guess what they or...
06/04/2026

A little leftover mix mix.
Fulfilled a catering request did the UW Center for Taiwan Studies. Can you guess what they ordered? This is a yuba salad I made with what was left of their 涼麵 chilled noodles order.
In the States, the chilled noodles sauce focuses too strongly on the peanut butter with the peanut often being too rich and the sauce too thick for my liking. In Chiayi, a region in Taiwan known for their chilled noodles, their sauce is heavier on the vinegar, includes mayonnaise, and is also watered down significantly to make an almost soupy texture. I opted for a compromise between the two, a lighter, soupier sauce that's heavier on the garlic and vinegar (shout out to .co brown rice vinegar) that includes sesame but no peanuts. I find that this sauce offers a lot of room for play. When it's summer, a little tomato in there gives it such a warm sweetness.

One way I tried to explain 肉羹 / 肉焿 to folks is to call them boiled nuggets. Not the most appetizing explanation so I'll ...
28/03/2026

One way I tried to explain 肉羹 / 肉焿 to folks is to call them boiled nuggets. Not the most appetizing explanation so I'll elaborate here. 羹 gēng is a unique technique I haven't seen often outside of Taiwan. We take pieces of meat (often pork) and wrap it in more meat farce (usually fish paste) to make a chewy meaty bite reminiscent of chicken nuggets that are boiled and added to soups instead of fried. I suspect it was invented as a way to savor meat when it wasn't as widely available; bulk it up with fish paste. But this resourcefulness really became a way to celebrate and meld different textures.
This old school Taiwanese dish continues to be popular in southern Taiwan, specifically 鹿港 Lukang, where I had this bowl. This one with reconstituted strips of dried squid is my favorite. The squid and 肉羹 nuggies offer two very different types of QQ texture. The broth is thickened just the right amount to be glossy and slippery on the tongue. And always, a hit of white pepper for bite.

Post pop-up reflection on Taiwanese breakfast: I'm always surprised by how passionate people get about Taiwanese breakfa...
23/03/2026

Post pop-up reflection on Taiwanese breakfast:
I'm always surprised by how passionate people get about Taiwanese breakfast. I hear it all the time, "Taiwanese breakfast is the best! Why don't you open a Taiwanese breakfast place?!" Well, never say never.
Truth is that I've never been that into Taiwanese breakfast. At least, not the type that folks typically know it to be. It's a lot of carbs to start the day and the truth is that my body can't hang with that kind of action. But Taiwanese folks love food. They wake up thinking about it, making it, planning to get it. So luckily for me, for this menu, the theme of Taiwanese breakfast, just like the cuisine itself, is much broader than folks imagine it to be. Case in point, these folks in downtown Lukang selling bawan for breakfast for over 50 years. I really had fun with this menu and I'm so thankful to everyone who came out for this one.
Special thanks to hosts .cooperative (IOU two k***s of ginger!), cooks and team members .chris.pratt , sous chef in arms who slayed his own pop-up debut .beur, farmers/producers .

I keep waiting for old age to make me a morning person but after years of working restaurant hours, it ain't happening. ...
16/03/2026

I keep waiting for old age to make me a morning person but after years of working restaurant hours, it ain't happening. Luckily, jet lag in Taiwan means I'm up with the early birds, usually the elderly, who camp out at places like this beef soup shop. They've enjoyed this soup since they were kids and today, share this same bowl with their grandchildren. Longstanding shops like these are farther and fewer. Though not the case with this location, many long time small vendors open up shop as the sun rises and sells out before noon, making these soups and small rice bowls, categorical breakfast items.

Back when I was working in Taipei, I came to find this lady on a regular basis. She is my 韭菜盒 chive pocket, sometimes ca...
14/03/2026

Back when I was working in Taipei, I came to find this lady on a regular basis. She is my 韭菜盒 chive pocket, sometimes cabbage pocket lady. Each morning she set up this table at the morning wet market with dough, filling, and a hot plate and proceeded to work. After a couple times of grabbing breakfast from her, she asked me where I worked and I explained that I took on a stage at a nice restaurant.
"Is the chef mean?" She asked.
I did not comment, but gave a little smile 🤭.
She added a little extra dough to my pocket, a little extra filling, sealed it quickly with her fingertips and said, “好好加油”
"Add oil/add gas", a figure of speech when someone is rooting for you. And she did. She added some oil to the hot plate, seared up my large cabbage pocket and handed it to me.
With that, we developed the relationship common throughout Taiwan. She is chive pocket lady, I am little chef girl. I couldn't do a true Taiwanese breakfast menu without including *my*Taiwanese breakfast.

An ode to Taiwanese breakfast. That's the next pop-up this month! I think the offerings will surprise you. So many peopl...
12/03/2026

An ode to Taiwanese breakfast. That's the next pop-up this month! I think the offerings will surprise you. So many people think of the same things when we speak of Taiwanese breakfast: shaobing, youtiao, soy milk, danbing. But if you take an early morning stroll, you'll see so many options, some or the best offerings in the city powering the locals through their busy days - a 60 year old beef soup shop that sells out by noon, a breakfast burger and hash brown joint by the local high school, award winning cafes serving geisha coffee, and that sweet lady at the wet market making leek and cabbage pockets.
I think back to the month I staged at logy in Taipei and how I savored the few hours of quiet morning I had to explore these options before jumping into work. The upcoming tasting menu celebrates these moments and is in honor of those vendors who wake up at the crack of dawn every day to give the rest of the city a nourishing start.
Scope the menu and secure the rez for Saturday, March 21st via the link in our bio! We have seatings at 10am and noon at Pidgin .cooperative !

21/02/2026

Getting excited about cooking for everyone on Monday! It's so heartwarming to see the guest list and catch the names of old friends. I remember my first Lunar New Year after moving to Seattle, I killed myself trying to find all the right things and prepare it the right way, just grasping at any sense of familiarity, any chance at prosperity. The tired, dejected, and homesick me back then would not believe the number of Taiwanese brands and options available here today. Every year I go back to Taiwan and lately I find, I no longer have to bring back as much because it's all already here. I only now need to carry with me renewed memories of flavors, new knowledge, and added inspiration.
The me back then could never imagine the community here now, the names on this guest list, the full on big kid restaurant we now have 🤯. Just wow. New Year has never been about luck or fortune for me, it's looking back at the seeds sown and commemorating its growth, finding the strength to continue onward. 一馬當先 🐎 Be the first and lead the way. What's desired will come in time.
P.S. I'm closing sales for Monday's pop up tomorrow evening. Snag a seat while you can!

新年快樂! We are officially entering Lunar New Year, not just a countdown or a single evening bash but a whole week of festi...
17/02/2026

新年快樂! We are officially entering Lunar New Year, not just a countdown or a single evening bash but a whole week of festivities and different dishes enjoyed with all the cautious hopes for the year to come.
In historic Lukang, the locals gather for 麵線糊, a wheat vermicelli soup that is thickened to resemble a slurry. In Taiwan's coastal cities, these long vermicelli noodles are strung up and stretched until they have hair like thinness and are as long as the longevity we wish for our loved ones, dried by the salty winds. It's also called mee sua/misua in other parts of Taiwan and in the Philippines. One product becomes so many different dishes. Lukang's 麵線糊, a soupier version with little pork nuggets and healthy pinch of white pepper, is known for its thick, almost slurry consistency that sticks to your ribs without weighing on you so you have a renewed zest to explore all the narrow alleys that Lukang had to offer.

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埔頭街63號
Lukang
505

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